Fatherhood: Accepting Responsibility

Fatherhood:  Accepting Responsibility

Most of us consider ourselves responsible and think “oh, this is the easy one”.  Is it?  I think not.  While many of us might be responsible in showing up for work, in renewing our drivers’ license and some even pay their bills on time, accepting responsibility is an area in which men have struggled since the beginning of time.

Let’s take a look in The Book of Genesis, which is the first book of the bible.  What happened when God confronted Adam about eating the forbidden fruit?  Did he man up and say yes God, I disobeyed and I ate the forbidden fruit, I am sorry?  No instead of owning his disobedience he responded”

“The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate.”  Genesis 3:12 (ESV).

Let’s examine Adam’s response closely.  It is very clear that he is not accepting responsibility and he is shifting it to Eve.  But it gets worse.  Look at the words he uses “…the woman whom You gave me…”  (emphasis added)  Yes, that’s right he went even further and blamed God.  Ouch !!!

It does not stop there.  The bible is full of examples where people avoid responsibility.  King David put one of his generals in a position to be killed to cover up his adultery.  Peter denied knowing Jesus three times to avoid death himself.

Irresponsibility is not only in the bible, it exists in our daily lives.  I venture to say that we all attempt to avoid responsibility.  As I sat down to write this blog I decided to “google” excuses thinking I could just come up with a few of the most common excuses.  Well, as you can guess there were way too many to count.  Which is not surprising, we all use excuses.  Let’s face it we are human and we make mistakes.  The problem is none of us like admitting that we are the one responsible so we try to shift the responsibility or cover up the mistake.   It really takes courage to “stand up & man up” and accept responsibility.  Humans avoid accepting responsibility throughout their lives. When we are kids and we tell the little white lie of the dog eating our homework and as adults we justify being late for the important meeting because of heavy traffic instead of saying we overslept.

As Dads do we ever think of the behavior we are modeling for our children when are trying to avoid a phone call and ask our child to tell the caller we are not home?  Wouldn’t it be better to take the call?  We will get the unpleasantness out of the way and set a better example for our children. 

How about when we are driving with our children, look in the rear view mirror and notice that red lights are flashing on the car behind us.  Yes, the local police officer wants to have a chat about your driving habits.  Don’t the excuses flow once the conversation begins? All within ear shot of junior. 

I recently had a powerful teaching opportunity with my 11 year old grandson and it worked out great.   

I was asked to offer a prayer at the beginning of a professional boxing match, so I took him with me.  At the time I had a problem with my car.  The left blinker would not stop blinking and the right one would not blink at all. So as we were driving home at midnight you guessed it a police officer wanted to chat with me.  As soon as the officer got to my window I said “I bet you want to talk to me about my blinkers” and of course she said yes.  I explained what the problem was and that my mechanic was ordering the part.  Then I also had to explain that I misplaced my license that day (extremely responsible of me).  I handed her my registration and my Veteran’s Administration Id card and off she went.  I expected a repair order for the blinker and a ticket for not having my license.  Much to my surprise she returned without either.  She just returned my license and told me to be careful.  On the way home I was able to have a conversation with my grandson about how being honest and pleasant pays off.  Imagine if I had started to act surprised and tell lies.  I bet the conversation on the way home would have been much different.